How our events are reducing their carbon footprint
Our event teams recognise the urgency of addressing climate change and are working hard to reduce our carbon impact across five priority areas.
Becoming more energy sufficient
Our teams work hand-in-hand with all Easyfairs venues to reduce the energy consumption of our events.
We’re implementing strict energy consumption reduction plans and increasing the percentage of renewable energy that’s powering our venues and events. We’re also equipping our venues with LEDs and installing solar roof panels on three venues.
Promoting sustainable travel & accommodation
65% of our events run active campaigns to promote the use of public transport.
We’re lowering environmental impact in several ways. Our all-in formula with reusable stands and Smart Badge technology reduces our carbon footprint. While our regional and national focused events mean visitors don’t have to travel long distances. We’re also promoting green transport and partnering with hotels that have strong sustainability credentials.
Reducing our waste
39% waste reduction across all Easyfairs venues since 2018-2019.
We recognise the challenge of waste generation and management in the exhibition industry. So, we’ve made waste reduction a key part of our sustainability strategy.
We’ve recently launched several waste-reduction initiatives. These include:
Reducing stand waste
The majority of exhibition waste comes from single-use stands. To address this, we developed our ‘all-in and reusable stands’ concept, which offer a sustainable and innovative solution to the industry.
In 2022-23, 70% of all stands built at our events were reusable. We aim to increase this by 2% annually, starting in the 2023-2024 business year.
Sustainable carpet solutions
Traditional event carpets often end up in landfill. So, we’re aiming to use sustainable carpets at all events and venues by 2025.
To date, our events in the UK, France and Italy have all switched to 100% recyclable carpet. Our events in Germany and Switzerland have generally removed carpet from the aisles. While our Nordic and Netherlands venues have used reusable carpets for years.
No more single-use plastics
We aim to remove single-use plastic bottles from catering points by 2025.
Our longer-term vision is to entirely eradicate single-use plastics by 2030.
Reducing paper waste
Our Smart Badge Technology means we can significantly reduce paper waste at our events.
It allows our exhibitors to exchange information digitally without using paper brochures or folders.
Limiting freight and logistics emissions
Logistics and transportation contribute a lot to the overall emissions of an event. While the majority of emissions related to freight and logistics are beyond our immediate control, we are well aware we need to find workable solutions – and fast.
We are taking two main actions to reduce freight and logistics emissions:
Increasing the share of reusable stands
Our all-in model is reducing freight emissions. Rather than using individual trucks, we’re delivering all-in stands collectively, which reduces the number of vehicles on-site. In some cases, our all-in stands stay in our venues and don’t even need transportation.
70% of our event stands are already made of reusable modular structures. And from January 2024, we have a target to increase the number of reusable stands by a minimum of 2% each year.
Making the right procurement choices
We are 100 percent committed to aligning our procurement strategies with our sustainability ethos. So, we actively prioritise logistics suppliers and transportation companies that champion sustainable practices. This all contributes to reducing emissions across our entire supply chain.
Making our food more sustainable
Food is important in shaping the experiences at our events, but we also recognise its potential environmental impact. We’re already running many initiatives to transform catering practices at our venues. However, we’re always striving to do more.
Recently, our events have made sustainable food one of their main priorities. They’ve pioneered plant-powered menus and have ensured vegan and vegetarian options are always available.
Over the last year, 22% of events have had a no-red-meat policy at Easyfairs-controlled catering points.
Tracking our progress
To track our progress and stay transparent, we’ve implemented the ESG Event Scorecard. A comprehensive tool that quantifies and monitors our achievements in real-time.